Globalization: A Basic Text, 2nd Edition

CHAPTER 7GLOBAL ECONOMIC FLOWSPRODUCTION AND CONSUMPTION

• Trade
  • Trade surpluses and deficits
  • Global trade: economic chains and networks
  • Global value chains: China and the US
• Increasing Competition for Commodities
• The Economic Impact of the Flow of Oil
  • Oil wealth
  • Oil imports to oil-rich nations
  • Increasing food prices
• Race to the Bottom and Upgrading
  • Upgrading in the less developed world?
• Outsourcing
  • Creative destruction and outsourcing
• Financial Globalization
  • The Great Recession
• Corporations, People, and Ideas
  • Changing corporate structure
  • MBA students
  • Management ideas
• Consumption
  • Consumer objects and services
  • Consumers
  • Consumption processes
  • Consumption sites
  • Global resistance
• Chapter Summary

In 2012, Julie Keith, a mother of two in the United States, opened a box of Halloween decorations she bought at Kmart, a major US discount chain. Inside the box, she found a note from a man who said he was imprisoned in a Chinese labor camp, where he was forced to work 15 hours per day, seven days a week (Jacobs 2013). The note requested, “Sir: If you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Right Organization.” The note, which travelled 5,000 miles before reaching its recipient, reveals one of the many interesting and hidden dimensions of global economic flows. Having examined various economic structures in the previous chapter, we now turn to an examination of these flows, especially as they relate to production and consumption. ...